Henk's journey thru life

[rube]

Ok, I understand.
Perhaps you can go then for 1 year as you suggest. If you like it, even though it might not THE best thing in the world, it is another 'adventure', and well paid.
Then you quit after the 1st year. I don't know what the contract is, but there is always a way out (can't handle stress any longer etc.).

If you don't like it, but do it only for the money, then don't do it.

Having said that, I would have dificulty to decide also if I were in your shoes

Oh, and try to get the most out of it! Better payment or perks. As I said, you have a very strong negotion position. They already know you wanted to leave, still they offer you another project. It means they make money out of you.

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Leaving Holland again. Having met some of the younger generation over here (15-25 years of age), I noticed:
* The younger generation hardly wants to work (small jobs) to pay for their consumer needs or study
* The needs however are tremendous increased from when I was that young. Kids are even disappointed (actual story) that they were getting an iPhone 4 instead of iPhone 5 .... crazy world
* Nowadays students in the Netherlands end up with a debt, in my days, this was unheard of. I had 2 jobs during study to pay for it, ending with no debt, and it also gave the pleasure to pay for it myself

I wonder, if this is the case, how they will discover ERE methods.... how to make them aware?

[DutchGirl]

... Maybe you can start a blog? Mix cool travel stories and working-abroad stories with stories on how you saved money, invested, and are now ready to retire early, if you want to...

[henrik]

I'd say it depends on the country you are offered and whether you want to go there. You seem to be in a position to make these decisions based on other factors than money now:)

[Hankaroundtheworld]

It is indeed funny, the moment I said "I want to leave", the job offers start to increase. Today, I was getting another offer. There must be some secret force to test me if I am really convinced to start ERE period I am going to take time to compare Quality of Life with these offers, and hopefully I will have the wisdom to make the right decision. Thanks all for your comments, it does help.

[rube]

Sounds great. We'll read here what decisions you'll make and how you like it!

[mxlr650]

I am going to take time to compare Quality of Life with these offers, and hopefully I will have the wisdom to make the right decision.

Here are some aspects to consider before deciding next steps:

Not sure when you started thinking about ERE – if you had been thinking for a while and had a set date, then it would be difficult to push the dates out and work at a job instead; OTOH if ERE is your recent foray, it might make sense to formulate/crystallize your ERE plan while on this new job so you have clarity on at-least your first few ERE years.

Marginal utility of 200k EUR -- if it greatly improves your ERE quality then go for it, else the new job may be something you might not enjoy fully knowing you are already FI

If you were planning to travel during ERE, then you should take this job since it essentially allows you to do travels near the new country while getting paid.

If you do decide to take this job, make an effort to learn how ignore corporate BS – your main priority should be making good money while having little responsibilities, and ensuring your job is stable for next couple years.

Good luck!!

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Thanks mxlr650, that triggers some thoughts:

(a) ERE plan
In all honesty, a real ERE plan I have never made. Only recently (last 6 Months) I have started reading many books around it, and I somehow regret that I should have done sooner
However, in a less-structured way, it has been on my mind for around 6-7 years, the moment I was looking with my wife for a B&B opportunity in a nice Country (and then reduce Corporate Life gradually). In the end, this idea never came to real fruit, probably because I was not comfortable with my Net-worth position.
The last 2 years, I have started to track my Net-worth position better, and creating excel-based calculations on how much I could live with that amount. At least, without reading about FI and ERE, i was preparing for the financial base for it. At least that part of ERE (reaching FI). Regarding the "mindset" part of ERE, this has not yet come to a full embracing. True, i have started to look more at Quality of Life, also exploring to start for myself instead of being part of big Corporate environment, etc... but it has not yet created enough root in my life (hence the struggling you see in my Journal).

(b) Next steps:
More people have now suggested that I should first create a good plan, either for starting something myself (and only work a few Months per year) or just a broader ERE plan (okay, the extreme part is getting less with the years). I probably should give it a year, accept this new Contract for now (at least new Country adventure), and start creating a good ERE plan in parallel, and then live up to it.
I already discussed with my wife, she agrees, and she said, if I have enough of the Company in one year time, I can still decide to stop and use the ERE plan moving forward.

The coming weeks I will make the decision

[Hankaroundtheworld]

There are those days that you feel more aware of your life and that you appreciate it more. In those days, i feel content with what has life brought so far, like a good relationship with my wife, being healthy, having good relationship with brothers/sisters & friends, having made the decision to see the world - expat style - , realizing that ERE/ERM is possible now, knowing that there still so much to explore in life (I am very curious in general), or just simple reading a good book with a glass of wine. In those days, I do not look at the bad developments in the world and what human beings are capable of in the wrong way. Today is such a day that everything seems right. OMG, I sound like I am one of those happy religious people but that is certainly not the case.

[robby152]

Lol, way to go Hank! Seeing all of these people 'arriving' at the goal of ERE keeps me motivated and excited. The most encouraging thing is that it seems that you aren't relying on some sort of external stimulation to do things like 'explore in life' and all that that brings, but have an internal motivation to, well, live. I think so many people are missing that single ingredient, which is what keeps them from dreaming about something bigger and more free.

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Interesting that you mention the internal of self-motivation aspect. I automatically assume that people have this internal driver, but you are right, that is not always the case. One Comedian in the Netherlands once described it very clearly, he said "Most of the people just want a little bit of fun", in other words, no major drivers or desires or dreams, just little pleasures. Personally I feel like "Darwin", i would love to step on a boat, have a great team around me, and start exploring the beauty of the world, analyze it as well, and come to greater ideas. Luckily my wife brings me sometimes back with both feet on the ground, I am not Darwin, but this internal drive to explore will not fade away.

[jacob]

I think a lot of people operate from a perspective of observing other people and copying their choices and then proceed to set up a structure that limits the choices they would subsequently have to make. I believe this is deliberately done to make life predictable and cognitively easier.

From the perspective of minimizing thinking-effort, this is the optimal effort and it's understandble why it's so popular.

For example, getting in debt is financially detrimental, but in terms of mental energy, it's the easiest option, because the person doesn't need to spend energy delaying gratification, and also there's no need to spend energy considering what the interest money could have been spent on... much easier to say that "That's nice but I can't because I have this mortgage, student loan, career, ... "

Knowing only the lifestyle they copied and having restricted themselves to this lifestyle also explains the severe cognitive dissonance they experience when they're confronted with anyone (e.g. ERE person) who made different choices. Notice how objections to ERE are practically never framed in terms of "ERE lacks this particular internal consistency" but rather "ERE does not match up with the only world I know, therefore it's wrong".

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Thanks Jacob, true, the "Mind is lazy" (nicely described in the book of Daniel Kahneman -thinking fast and slow), so it is indeed easier to copy a lifestyle then to find your own unique way.

It triggered some thinking about ERE, mainly related to "is this something for everyone, or is it more "elite" thinking"?
* Is ERE easy to understand, and can it be easily implemented? Well, the FI type thinking, yes, but the trouble is the transition, the willingness to change. It is like with losing weight, which basically means, change to a more healthy lifestyle. Many people can temporarily lose weight, but face troubles changing their lifestyle more permanently. I see the same with ERE, easy to understand, more difficult to execute & transition.
* Is ERE for everyone? Well, 2.5 Billion people live on 1 or 2 USD / day, they are in survival mode. Do not think they have ERE on mind (they hardly online either). I have lived in Africa, and I do see people being happy with 100 Euro / Month and supporting their families, so not necessarily bad, and they might be better in survival than "western" people if the world goes to shambles. But can we call that ERE methodology or mindset? Frugal for sure but they do not save money (do not even have bank accounts). At least, they do not make debts, just living from day to day within the means they have.
* How would the world look like if everyone goes ERE? For sure, Mother Earth will be happy (because we use the Earth resources more carefully), also, we can see it as the World Operations Model being very efficient. Business models would change to creating value to support ERE lifestyles, a lot more co-operation and sharing models between people. I am not a Macro Economist, but I can imagine that we have to re-invent Economic models, how we rate "progress", etc..quite a Transformation, and I wonder how long that will take, and how much the suffering will be during the transition.
* Advantages if ERE movement remains "small"? I do see value that ERE minded people can take advantage because others do not follow. For instance, if we invest money into stocks (index funds), then we can be happy if the old Economic models will prosper (growth, more margin, better stock prices), and this requires that people continue spending like consumers, create debt, etc... As said, I am not an Economist, but I can imagine the correlation between ERE FI thinking and Investing.

Some of my thoughts of today

[Aus_E_Expat]

Henk,

I will be interested to read where you end up / do next.

I have also been a long time expat and wonder about returning home (to Australia in my case) after 27 years in the expat life. It will be a culture shock.

I agree with your comments about first world kids etc, although in Asia now I see so many kids/people with smart phones, on social media etc.

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Hi all, some thoughts of the moment.

(A) I am on a previsit to the Country related to the potential 2-year Contract that the Company proposed. Not easy, my wife is not fond of this Country .... so all the basic reasons for ERE/ERM pop up, and it will be a tough decision we together need to make. Lucky we also have an offer for a 1-year extension in the existing location that we are, but that job is not the best. All in all, not an easy decision, so starting ERE/ERM right now, is still on the table, instead of delaying 1-2 years.

(B) I am reading into "meditation", not an easy subject for me, I am a very rational guy, but I realize that "living in the moment" is important, and that meditation can be a technique to realize this

(C) Some other thoughts of today, more like a confession, in the location that we are, there is not much in getting access to Media, which is partially fine. We already ditched TV in 2005, and still happy about that, but sometimes you want to see some Movies or TV series, or read latest book, or listen to latest music, and here comes the confession: even tough I sometimes buy a book online (eBook), I do download a lot of Movies and TV series via Torrent, for instance, "House of Cards" and "Game of Thrones". I know all the pro's and con's of free downloading, but I still cannot get my head around, why I justify that it is okay. I now think that it has to do with the situation that many people face: "being a wage slave in a cubicle", somehow you think that the suffering justifies to take a few things for free by downloading. Or is it only the easiness of getting access to Content. Like I said, even as a well educated person with enough empathy and moral values, why is it that I am okay with this?

Anyway, some sharing of my thoughts today

[leeholsen]

Hi all, some thoughts of the moment.

(B) I am reading into "meditation", not an easy subject for me, I am a very rational guy, but I realize that "living in the moment" is important, and that meditation can be a technique to realize this

Anyway, some sharing of my thoughts today

dont know if you have heard of the silva method, its a meditation type deal. i read the book after hearing neal boortz say it changed his life.

there's also seminars you can go to and i keep meaning to go to see if i'm going to totally buy in; but its supposedly really famously effective if you master it.

you can buy the book used.

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Will look into it and try, thanks leeholsen! (has it changed your life as well?)

[mxlr650]

(C) Some other thoughts of today, more like a confession, in the location that we are, there is not much in getting access to Media, which is partially fine. We already ditched TV in 2005, and still happy about that, but sometimes you want to see some Movies or TV series, or read latest book, or listen to latest music, and here comes the confession: even tough I sometimes buy a book online (eBook), I do download a lot of Movies and TV series via Torrent, for instance, "House of Cards" and "Game of Thrones". I know all the pro's and con's of free downloading, but I still cannot get my head around, why I justify that it is okay. I now think that it has to do with the situation that many people face: "being a wage slave in a cubicle", somehow you think that the suffering justifies to take a few things for free by downloading. Or is it only the easiness of getting access to Content. Like I said, even as a well educated person with enough empathy and moral values, why is it that I am okay with this?

It is a well acknowledged fact that many who would not steal a book from the bookstore/library have no problem downloading things off the net. While mp3 for 0.99c has changed things, movies industry is still in stone ages. I would suggest you have two wifi routers at home, one with password, and another without password for plausible deniability. If the routers are behind a DSL/Cable modem, they are NATed so unique identity might be hard to determine unless you use a unique operating system like OSX or Linux (using generic W7 with IE will make it harder to detect)

There are few more options you can consider: Netflix is not expensive ($8 per month), and if your company has office in the USA you can login to USA VPN server to skirt geolocation restriction.

You may also want to consider: https://plex.tv/

[theanimal]

One of my current law professors has scared me out of downloading anything illegal ever again. I haven't downloaded anything illegal for a few years now but the risk far outweighs the benefit. He told us of a story of a woman who got caught downloading music files illegally. She was fined $600,000 dollars. The amount of songs she downloaded? Only 9..

Just think..would you want someone stealing your writing, images, music etc.? The lack of ethical values that many display in my generation is quite alarming..I don't think it will bode well for the business culture in the future.

[Hankaroundtheworld]

Hi, thanks for the reaction, not to dwell to long on the downloading subject, but I think there is something more fundamental going on. I do not believe that a whole generation has become suddenly low on ethical values. It seems we have started to look different at digital content versus the physical package that it used to have. However, even when I was young, we shared music (via tapes) and felt good about that, the only thing is, that it is now accelerated via Internet and sharing possibilities, and even expanded to Movies/TV and Books.

Anyway, lets get back to ERE/ERM topic. Have been reading some other Journals, and I am really impressed how some people are really determined and reach success early in their lives (from ERE point of view). Even though I never followed this methodology and also never had this mindset, I am still inspired by it, hence that I like to be on this forum. I am currently on the edge of accepting the 2 year contract, the coming week will be the decision moment. It would delay my ERM moment to age of 50, and I am reasonable content with this. It is in a new Country, new Adventure, new People you meet, perhaps new Ideas, and to some extent I like the Job content (but not always the job life), so I see this as acceptable value to spend more life-energy this way. I discussed with my wife that I will use these 2 years as well to prepare for life after ERM deadline, I want to learn some new skills the coming 2 years (like meditation, try online business, better investing, etc..).